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OPINION: I took the long-suffering wife to Cuba for our honeymoon. Shes a lucky woman. Back then Fidel Castro was still in charge and I wanted to see what real communism looked like.

Readers, it wasnt pretty. We saw children with treatable deformities in a country that claims to have a world-class health system. We encountered intelligent ambitious men reduced to pan handling for tips as bellhops and endured street girls touting themselves brazenly for a few dollars.

Cuba isnt the only dictatorship Mrs Grant has been dragged to. Gadhafis Libya was the other stand-out, but weve travelled to Myanmar, Mozambique, Vietnam and Cambodia. I proposed in Laos, a country that has never had a free election and has engaged in brutal oppression of the Hmong people.

I had no moral qualms in visiting countries ruled by evil governments. I have done business in China and have commercial contracts with a firm in Vietnam. I tried to get a visa to North Korea a few years back, but was denied on account of being a columnist. Journalists are banned from the Hermit Kingdom and the distinction between a columnist and a journalist got lost in translation. Or perhaps they took the time to read my columns. I remain unsure.

Many reasonable people feel a deep sense of unease trading with countries that are ruled by malevolent governments and this issue was highlighted for many last week when we signed an updated free-trade agreement with China.

READ MORE:* With the US now calling China's treatment of the Uyghurs 'genocide', how should NZ respond?* New Zealand signs upgraded free trade agreement with China* China is building vast new detention centres for Uighur Muslims in Xinjiang

These concerns are sensible; Id be worried about the humanity of an individual who didnt consider the ethics involved; so let me share my perspective.

For a start, sanctions do not work. No tyrant has moderated his behaviour once they were imposed. Cuba, North Korea, Iran, Saddam Husseins Iraq and dozens of African kleptocrats provide a mountain of evidence for the thesis that tyrants are impervious to external economic forces.

Governments that are subject to political and economic pressures at home can be bullied into behaving better domestically. South Africa is the most obvious example but there are others. Such niceties are utterly ineffective against true dictatorships such as Cuba, North Korea and China.

The Kim family developed a communist dynasty in North Korea whilst their people starved. Sanctions did nothing to dent the ruling familys power or moderate their tyranny. Today, while many of his people live on the edge of hunger Kim Jong-uns quality of life remains undiminished.

Not only do they not work, the rationale for limiting trade is immoral. At the extreme, it amounts to a demand upon a civilian population to risk their lives to topple a government or face the economic consequences. Sometimes these consequences are barbaric; with much of the population of Iraq exposed to malnutrition in the 1990s.

On the surface, the logic of sanctions is appealing. What, a reasonable person can ask, is the moral justification of doing business with places like Saudi Arabia, where women are denied the same rights as men and dissidents are whipped and often beheaded?

If sanctions worked imposing a short-term economic harm on ourselves to help free an oppressed people would be the right thing to do. But they dont. They impoverish the civilian population, sometimes resulting in their death, for no material advantage.

Saul Loeb/AP

Outgoing US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared China was committing a genocide against the Uyghur. (File photo)

Today, the super-power of human rights abuses is China and the outgoing American Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, declared that China was committing a genocide against the Uyghur. Surely if we are ever to draw the line, it must be at genocide?

To understand why the answer is no, consider that we do not trade with a nation. We trade with firms, individuals, collectives or whatever enterprise has been established to undertake commerce.

To refuse to trade with the factories, farms and supermarkets in China because of the crimes committed by those running the Communist Party is to engage in collective responsibility and punishment. We are harming one person for the crimes of another and doing nothing to assist the victims while the perpetrators live in undiminished luxury.

But if you still remain unconvinced let us look a China through a longer historical lens.

Under the isolationist and inward-looking Mao Zedong, tens of millions of Chinese perished in his various programmes. He is, objectively, the bloodiest tyrant in human history. Since his death, China has embraced not only its unique version of capitalism but the world; through trade, education and tourism.

China has moderated as a direct result of its economic engagement with the West and this transformation began with Richard Nixons visit to China in 1972, during the height of the Cultural Revolution. The deepening economic ties has helped lift a billion Chinese out of poverty and makes a return to the violent extremes of the past unlikely.

An argument can be made that trade enhances the economic power of countries with expansionary ambitions and self-preservation dictates prudence. I am unpersuaded by this line of thought but that isnt the focus of this column.

Stuff

Damien Grant: We may be economically impotent but our voice carries a heavy moral weight. We should use it.

We should be more concerned about China using economic levers to pressure us. New Zealand appears to be distancing itself from its five-eyes partners in recent months, especially in response to Hong Kong. A cynical observer may suspect that our muted reaction to the crackdown in the former British colony and our improved free-trade deal are connected.

Given the importance of our trade with China, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and her new Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta have a difficult path to walk.

While threats of economic pain for their citizens do not deter dictatorships, those running these regimes have demonstrated a desire for respectability. China in particular appears highly sensitive to criticism. We may be economically impotent but our voice carries a heavy moral weight. We should use it.

If Beijing elects to retaliate that is beyond our control; but while I believe we should trade with China, we should not become a vassal state in the process.

* Damien Grant is a regular columnist for Stuff, and a business owner based in Auckland. He writes from a libertarian perspective and is a member of the Taxpayers Union but not of any political party.

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The logic of sanctions is appealing, but do not work with communist countries - Stuff.co.nz